Net Worth Update: $433,149.74 [Down $10k]

Dayuum… Market shut us down this month! Said – “Try again next time, beyotch!” Haha…

But that’s the way the game’s played, eh? Some months it’s up, others it’s down, down, down. What’s important is that we stick to it for the long haul and do our best to pick up some shares on these off months to get better deals! Easily done too with automatic 401k contributions and the like – something I’ve missed for years now, boo hoo…

(I invest in a SEP IRA instead since I’m self-employed, but usually have to wait as I’m not sure the amount I’m able to invest each year until I know my overall profit.)

Unfortunately this also snaps our 4-month winning streak, but considering we’re up a good $86,000 since September, I can’t really cry too much :) Here’s how the last four months went:

Here’s How January Broke Down:

CASH SAVINGS(-$708.91): This area could have been a bit better last month, but between extra health care bills coming in and biz income still remaining semi-low, it is what it is and we work on improving this next round. Another reason to have hefty cash reserves laying around too!

529 College Savings(-$113.13): I don’t think we’ve added anything extra into this account for a bout a year. When things started heading south and we were holding tight to all extra money coming in… Hopefully we can get back to this again, and then create *another* college account for baby #2- yikes!

IRA: SEP(-$2,435.24): Nothing new added here either, although the yearly Drop o’ Cash is about to hit as soon as we finish our taxes! Gonna max this bad boy out as I do every single year since it’s our main retirement vehicle now. If only my boss gave me a match! ;)

IRA: ROTH(s) (-$1,673.12): Same story with this guy – nothing new added so the changes are completely up to what the market is doing. Though, we are still considering maxing this out as well as the SEP this year, just can’t tell if it’s smart or not yet considering our cash flow problem lately… We’ll see. I’d hate to break a maxing-out record here too after all these years!

IRA: TRADITIONAL(s) (-$6,355.75): And same story here too – nothing added in, and nothing that WILL be added in since all our retirement money hits the SEP first, and then the ROTH. Though after reading a lot of articles on why Traditionals can be better for early retirement, I will admit it’s sort of intrigued me. Not that I’m anywhere close to retiring early, of course :)

Here’s how our IRA Test is performing these days. Which, as always, still needs to be shut down.

IRA #1 (NOT Managed): $76,724.86 **Leader for two years now

IRA #2 (Managed, USAA funds only): $70,953.74

IRA #3 (Managed, ALL different funds): $71,636.37

AUTOS WORTH (kbb)(+$217.00): Don’t ask me why this went up, ask KBB.com :) But you’ll see my Caddy is still frozen there at $1,500 since it’s now too old to be tracked via KBB, haha… So all future changes in this category will be based off the Toyota’s value. Until we eventually get that minivan Escalade. Here’s the value of the two presently:

HOME VALUE (Realtor)($0.00): Nothing touched here either, since I don’t use places like Zillow or Redfin or whatever to track our values since they’re too all over the place. Instead I ping my realtor every 6-12 months for a quick assessment which I find to be much more accurate. And he happily obliges since he knows he’ll be making the sale one day in the (hopefully near) future! :)

MORTGAGES(-$657.32): We’re getting sooooooo much closer to not being underwater anymore!!! Only $3,342.81 to go and we’re Even Stephen! :) The power of time and paying a little extra towards it each and every month. So damn excited.

And that wraps up the first month of 2014. Not the sexiest, but also not the worst either. And as you can see from that graph of the past 12 months up there, I can only be thankful and count my blessings over the years.

How did you guys fair? Anything juicy or exciting go down in your financial worlds last month? Either way, keep on tracking and paying attention to it all! You’re future self is gonna love you for it!

Sorry and feel your pain. It is for the long terms though (and the market has been a bit mad lately…). It’s all come back eventually. Doing well, Jay; we’ll be cracking open this millionaire fizzy drink soon.

The market tanked yesterday, but it doesn’t really matter to me because all of my stock holdings are going to be used decades from now. Hopefully the downturn doesn’t last that long (hint: it won’t) :D!

I feel like all my investments are on sale right now. I wish I had more spare cash to invest! Our month wasn’t great…purchased a new computer (planned) purchased a new water heater (not planned). bye bye cash!

I’m not really in the market yet (I just have $1,000 “play money”) so I didn’t feel this, and can easily say “just wait it out”. That being said, I know I won’t like the downturns, even when I’m not needing the stocks until decades later (like what Lance said).

2014 is going to be a FUN one. In 3 months, we can finally apply for loan forgiveness for my wife which should zap the final $17,500 she has in students loans (the government actually does SOME things right :-)). I finally got some public retirement accounts to roll over into my 403b, so that should be an additional $12,000. And, consolidated some final loans at 0% and am paying down a sizable chunk over the minimum payment so within 24 months we’re consumer debt free babayyyyy. If things go well, I might be able to get it all done by this December.

Car went up in value! That is like finding gold right there! I too took a pretty good hit in the retirement accounts thanks to the market’s nose dive. But we’re young, so we’ve got plenty of time to make it up.

We were down this month too…only by $200 or so, but we have way fewer investments than you. I had to buy a new car, so if that hadn’t happened, we wouldn’t have lost networth. (We bought below KBB value, but then had to pay taxes on it, so that put us over!) Oh well! We keep moving forward!

I’m sure this was tough to write, but thanks for sharing! It is a lesson to us all that not EVERY month (or quarter or year) will be positive, even if you try your hardest to watch your expenses and increase your income each and every month. As you save more and more and build your net worth, then your net worth can increase (or decrease) in a larger dollar magnitude each day/week/month/year.

I think we lost some in the market, maybe $3K-$4K. I made a couple of moves that ended up ok, and of course a couple I’m kicking myself for not doing. Got a nice signing bonus this month with the new job though, and wife had an unexpected windfall, so cha-ching!

We were down about 23K for the month. Like J$ said, gotta roll with it… Its when the market is down that you should be licking your chops to buy. On the plus side, I started taking home an extra $650 a month 3 months ago and another $500 a month this last month. The wife told me last night her yearly bonus from work should be about 8K…. part of which will go towards a long needed new refrig. Any suggestions?

Keep on keepin’ on! Here’s hoping 2014 is a great year for business. I had some high spending in January due to car maintenance, which was scary bc it was my first month of self-employment but we got through it and now I’m glad February is a short month so I can do a little better!

We calculate our net worth quarterly instead of monthly in part because of market corrections like this; we hate seeing the value go down (we’ve been calculating net worth quarterly since 2010 and there was only one quarter in there where it went down, which was because of the market). When we do it quarterly then there’s also three months worth of debt repayment factored into the equation, which helps our net worth even if the markets are doing poorly. Like you say, it’s all part of the game. But it’s still no fun to see numbers going down when you’re working so hard :-)

January was a rough month of spending between visitors and creating a little office for myself (going to start studying for the GMAT and couldn’t bring myself to spend hours perched on the stools at my kitchen table). My mutual fund and 401(k) haven’t been too badly battered — but they also don’t have a TON of money in them… I am looking into opening a traditional IRA and seems like now might be a delightful time to start. Just debating the route to take.

Well, unless you can a) invent a time machine for me to go back and do traditionals from the get go or b) handle all the conversions for me in the future (maybe you have a future time machine?), then you’re stuck at “sorta” pal ;)

Hello 2014! Not a fun financial month for us for us either – $2,300 in unexpected rental damages (go emergency funds!), $552.39 mistakenly taken from our account by our insurance company (finally got it back), quit my job, and of course, the Roth 401(k) took a little dip. However, I am way inspired by your net worth graph – I need to go back and see what happened to you guys in October.

Ours went up, thanks to paying off a $4830 zero interest credit card, an increase in the value of our home (I use Homesnap every month), paying down the principal on our first mortgage and a few other things. My long term investments are in bonds rather than stocks, so I didn’t take a hit there. Next goal: savings property taxes of $4300 (plus or minus) by April 10. After scrimping to pay off that credit card, it won’t be easy, but I am using auto transfer to help me out. We’ll see if I make it without robbing the piggy bank to do so!

The best part is that you have a great cash reserve that will weather you through everything! But what goes down must come up! January was an okay month for me…I’m going to see if paying a bit more on my student loans can help bring me a bit closer to breaking even!

Problem with growth stocks is when the market turns they hit you in both the face and gut. We’ve lost the value of a nice car so far but I’m actually happy because it makes stocks actually safer. No bubble here.

If you aren’t planning on selling any of your equities, the drop ain’t nothing, right? It’s actually one of the reasons I track mine separate from the net worth, but I’m a total rebel when it comes to that. But a dip in the market might provide more of an opportunity to pick up some shares, at least that’s the way I’m looking at it.

Honestly? My accountant told me to :) I asked her which of the group she felt was the best, and she said SEP. I probably should have researched it a little more, but I’m one of those “as long as it’s 80% good I’m happy” type folks, and from what I’ve gathered it’s at least that.

I’m impressed with this net worth, especially considering you are pretty young, if I remember things correctly. You may have already answered this several places elsewhere, but are these figires for you on your own or for you and your wife combined? Love your web site!~

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